The former police officer who admitted to torturing Abner Louima in a Brooklyn stationhouse in 1997 testified in the retrial of Charles Schwarz Monday that his former colleague was never there.

Justin Volpe, who is serving 30 years in prison for his 1999 guilty plea, maintained that he acted alone and that Schwarz was not present during the attack. Repeating testimony from earlier proceedings, he said former officer Thomas Wiese, not Schwarz, was in the bathroom and did nothing to either stop or assist in the assault.

Volpe’s account directly contradicts the testimony of Louima, who said that a second officer beat him and pinned him to the ground of a bathroom floor as Volpe sodomized him with a broken broomstick and threatened to kill him if he told anyone. Louima has never identified Schwarz directly, but he maintains that second assailant was the same officer who drove him to the stationhouse, who was Schwarz.

Wiese, who was originally on the defense witness list, has decided at the last minute not to testify, invoking his Fifth Amendment right against possible self-incrimination. In earlier testimony he had given yet another version of the events, saying that he was the one who led Louima to the bathroom but that he did not go inside.

The prosecution rested its case Monday morning, ending a week of testimony from Louima and several officers who testified they saw Schwarz leading Louima to the bathroom door the night of the attack, August 9, 1997. The defense is now arguing that Schwarz wasn’t even inside the stationhouse at the time of the assault.

Volpe did not testify in Schwarz’s original trial, but did tell his account to a jury in a separate trial a year later, in which Schwarz, along with Wiese and a third officer, Thomas Bruder, were convicted of conspiring to obstruct justice. Those convictions were also overturned earlier this year in the appeal that won Schwarz this new trial on civil rights charges.

During Volpe’s cross-examination Monday, prosecutors introduced a tape of a conversation Volpe had with his father from prison just weeks ago. “This other guy,” Volpe can be heard saying on the tape, referring to Schwarz, “he's going home and I'm gonna’ be rotting in this f***ing place. I want my lawyers up here and they better start getting ready to do some strategizing and getting me some reduction."

Volpe goes on to suggest his planned testimony in Schwarz's favor might not be such a sure thing. “He might be in for a surprise,” he says. “Let's put it this way: If they think I'm falling on the sword again for nothing, they're out of their f***ing mind."

Despite the tape and intense questioning from prosecutor Alan Vinegrad, Volpe never wavered from his testimony that it was Wiese, not Schwarz, in the bathroom.

“I'm innocent,” Schwarz told reporters outside the courtroom. “I've been saying that all along, and what Justin Volpe said today about me not being in the bathroom reinforces what I've been saying all along.”

Schwarz's legal team insists Volpe chose to tell the truth when he could have lied in a deal with the government.

“Not only would he get his sentence cut, but if Justin Volpe said it was Chuck in the bathroom, Volpe would have been the government’s first witness,” said Ronald Fischetti, Schwarz’s attorney. “They would have put Volpe on the stand and had him say that Chuck Schwarz was with him in the bathroom, and argue to the jury, ÎWho better to put on the witness stand than the person who committed the crime?’"

Monday’s testimony also included new details from Volpe about the night of the attack as he tried to paint Louima as the instigator of the incident. He claimed Louima was the man who struck him in a scuffle outside a nightclub on Flatbush Avenue earlier on the night of the attack, and, for the first time, said he had returned blows.

“We were exchanging punches,” Volpe said. “I see a truck coming, next you know I got hit in the head very hard and fell to the ground. We were exchanging blows when I went to the ground.”

That melee was the reason Louima was arrested that night, but Louima said he was mistaken for another man and the charges against him were dropped.

Volpe also said Monday that he had lied at the time of his guilty plea when he consented that the purpose of his attack was to humiliate Louima. He said he would have said anything to get the trial over with.

The judge warned Volpe not to lie on the stand and instructed him not to tell the jury whether he had ever lied in court before. It remains to be seen whether Volpe's comment will hurt his credibility as a witness.

The defense is plans to wrap up its case on Tuesday or Wednesday after calling a few more witnesses.